The paper analyzes strategic behavior in a two-stage environmental choice problem under different information scenarios. Given uncertainty about environmental cost and irreversibility of development, “learning without destroying” emerges from strategic competition when information is endogenous and publicly available. This happens since agents trade off the higher payoff of being the first-mover against the potentially free acquisition of endogenous information without developing their own environmental endowment. We prove that in a 2X2 dynamic environmental game with payoff uncertainty and irreversibility publicly available endogenous information could lead players to destroy less in aggregate terms with respect to the case in which information is exogenous.